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China’s Best Business Class? Hainan Airlines pt.1

Published on 20 July 2018

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So, two weeks ago I had the opportunity to fly Hainan Airlines, in Business Class, on their new route from Dublin to Beijing.
After that, I flew from Beijing to Phuket (Thailand) for a little break. This post, and the video, is about the flight home.

China’s Best Business Class?

Hainan has been a SkyTrax 5* airline for a while. Though this week that excellent ranking was extended for another year. Furthermore the airline was included in the top-10 ranking of airlines, coming in at #8, in the company of the likes of Singapore Airlines, Emirates, ANA. As the only Chinese airline to be in that top-10, this probably makes Hainan Airlines product, China’s Best Business Class. By definition! Or, SkyTrax’ definition in any case 😉

Different Business Class Products

Overall, Hainan have an excellent Business Class product. Something to keep in mind though, is that they (like most airlines) have multiple types of aircraft, and Hainan Airlines use the Airbus 330 (both -200 and -300) and the Boeing 787 (both the -8 and -9). These types can all have different types of ‘hard product’ (basically, the seat that’s used).

On three of my four flights, I was on an Airbus A330-300, which is mostly used for long-haul flights. This type is configured with a ‘staggered’ 1-2-1 Business Class seat (as shown in the image below). Hainan Airlines are currently working on installing seats in a slightly more modern ‘reverse herringbone’ configuration. Which I’d love to try out also.

‘staggered’ 1-2-1 configurated Business Class

Part 1? What’s part 2?

So, I had planned to make one video about my whole journey home, from Phuket via Beijing to Brussels. But, as I started editing, I soon realised that such a video would become far, far to long. Well, for my taste anyway – I like my videos to be aroung 5-8 minutes long. So I decided to cut the video into two pieces: the one in this post, part 1, which is the journey until landing in Beijing.

Part 2 will follow next week, and will feature my lightning-visit to China’s Great Wall, Hainan’s HNA Club lounge and the flight ‘home’ to Brussels. It should be a good one.

Hainan Airlines Value

For this flight I was sponsored by Hainan Airlines, and it was provided to me free of charge. That makes the value great for me personally, but also objectively you get great value for money.

This flight, from Phuket to Beijing was a short, 5 hour(ish), red-eye flight. A red-eye flight is a flight that leaves at night and arrives early in the morning. Because of to the length of the flight there was no amenity kit, however, there was a very nice thick quilt provided, and before breakfast I got a small cup of mouthwash, and plenty of wet towels throughout the flight. There was one meal, a breakfast (though, I could have chosen to eat after take-off as well, but that would have cut too much into my sleeping time…).